Check-forgery Ring Believed To Prey On Donors To Group

October 06, 1987|By Rob Karwath.

An apparently prolific check-forgery ring has bilked several suburban banks out of thousands of dollars, and police suspect that the ring is using the checking-account numbers of people who donated to a nonprofit citizens group.

The group, National People`s Action (NPA), which has offices in the Loop, has begun investigating how photocopies of donation checks apparently slipped into the hands of the ring, a group spokesman said Monday.

Sarah Jane Knoy, a group project director, said the checks were collected this summer when NPA workers went door-to-door in Chicago and the suburbs seeking donations to help the group lobby against Commonwealth Edison Co.`s proposed rate-increase plan.

Knoy said she suspects that photocopies of the donation checks were stolen from the nonprofit group`s offices.

Also Monday, police in west suburban Elmhurst said they have scheduled a Thursday meeting with officers from about a dozen other suburban police departments to trade information on the ring`s apparent movements. Police from Chicago, suburban Cook County, Du Page County and McHenry County are expected to attend, said Elmhurst Detective Ken Carr.

Police in west suburban Western Springs and Broadview already have arrested three Chicago women who they think were working as ``runners`` for the ring when they tried to cash phony checks at banks in the suburb, said Western Springs Detective Paul Messina. Police from at least three other departments are searching for suspects.

``We`re dealing with a check-cashing ring, not just one individual who is doing this to get a couple of extra bucks,`` said Detective Bill Soyk of the Midlothian police, one of the departments searching for suspects.

``We`re dealing with people who do this for a living-a fairly large number of people.``

Police said the ring worked like this:

Blank payroll checks were stolen from Chicago-area businesses. Ring members then stole photocopies of the donation checks. The donation checks contained the names, addresses, account numbers and signatures of the donors. Ring members then went to the banks of the NPA donors and impersonated the donors. They tried to cash the stolen payroll checks, made out in the names of the donors.

None of the checks was for less than $600, and most were for more than $900, said Detective Dennis Olszewski of the Oak Forest police.

To convince tellers that they were legitimate customers, ring members often cashed only part of the payroll check and deposited the rest. Ring members also carried phony employment ID cards. The cards contained a photo of the ring member identifying the person as the NPA donor.

Banks that cashed the phony payroll checks did not realize they had been victims of a ruse until days later when the checks bounced, police said.

The donors usually did not learn that they had been impersonated until weeks later, police said, when they received their bank statements and saw that their accounts had been lowered to cover the amounts that had been paid out to the ring members.

``When you look at it, you see that they really worked at it,`` said Len Walter, business-financial editor for radio station WBBM-AM and a victim of the scheme.

This summer, his wife wrote a $15 check to the citizens group, said Walter, a south suburban resident.